Famine

Catalogue Reference:(RGS) S0001995

A photograph taken during the terrible famine of 1876-1878 in Tamil Nadu, south India during which an estimated 3.5 to 4 million people died, representing possibly as much as one eighth of the rural population. A starving farmer with his young child look at the dying animal in front of them which the original photographic caption describes as "the last of the herd".